Publications

Mercury (Hg) concentrations and their associated toxicological effects in terrestrial ecosystems of the Gulf of Mexico are largely unknown. Compounding this uncertainty, a large input of organic matter from the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill may have altered Hg cycling and bioaccumulation dynamics. To test this idea, we quantified blood concentrations of total mercury (THg) in Seaside Sparrows (

From April-May 2024, the NASA Mentors who span eleven Distributed Active Archive Centers (DAACs) co-led the third Champions Cohort with the NASA Openscapes project team, this year focusing on, teaching lessons they adapted for geospatial and cloud analysis. The Cohort included nine international research teams from academia and government that were curious about working with NASA Earthdata in the

As of 2024, there are 32 National Scenic and Historic Trails (NSHTs) in the system administered by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), National Park Service, and U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service. The BLM administers, manages, and protects 19 of these trails as part of its system of national conservation lands. Various laws, regulations, and policies require that the BLM conduct and m

Intertribal networks for collecting and analyzing hydrologic and environmental data are growing. The U.S. Geological Survey can be a key partner with Tribal Nations in the further development of network capacity. A first step is the internship opportunity available through the partnership between the USGS and The Wildlife Society: The Native American Research Assistantship Program.

Seismic boundaries caused by phase transitions between olivine polymorphs in Earth's mantle provide thermal and compositional markers that inform mantle dynamics. Seismic studies of the mantle transition zone often use either global averaging with sparse arrays or regional sampling from a single dense array. The intermediate approach of this study utilizes many densely spaced seismic arrays distri

Several modelling and observational studies suggest deep water formation in the subpolar North Pacific as a possible alternative mode of thermohaline circulation that occurred in the warm Pliocene, a time when global atmospheric partial pressure of carbon dioxide was like the modern atmosphere (~400 ppm). We test this hypothesis by measuring the δ13C of the benthic foraminifer Cibicidoides wueller

Determining the timing and cause for ancient hillslope failures proves difficult in the western United States, yet critical as it ties directly into groundmotion estimates for hazardous events. This knowledge gap is important to confront as hillslope failures are candidates to be triggered by earthquakes along active plate boundaries. We identify two prehistoric, i.e., preinstrumental history, deb

Urban land cover types influence the urban microclimates. However, recent work indicates the magnitude of land cover's microclimate influence is affected by aridity. Moreover, this variation in cooling and warming potentials of urban land cover types can substantially alter the exposure of urban areas to extreme heat. Our goal is to understand both the relative influences of urban land cover on lo

Wildfires and climate change are having transformative effects on vegetation composition and structure, and post-fire management may have long-lasting impacts on ecosystem reorganization. Post-fire aerial seeding treatments are commonly used to reduce runoff and soil erosion, but little is known about how seeding treatments affect native vegetation recovery over long periods of time, particularly

In a warming climate, an intensifying fire regime and higher likelihood of extreme rain are expected to increase watershed sediment yield in many regions. Understanding regional variability in landscape response to fire and post-fire rainfall is essential for managing water resources and infrastructure. We measured sediment yield resulting from sequential wildfire and extreme rain and flooding in

Vesicularity of individual pyroclasts from airfall tephra deposits is an important parameter that is commonly measured at basaltic volcanoes. Conventional methods used to determine pyroclast vesicularity on a large number of clasts has the potential to be time consuming, particularly when rapid analysis is required. Here we propose dynamic image analysis on two-dimensional (2D) projection shapes o

Remote sensing can be an effective tool for mapping river bathymetry, but the need for direct measurements to calibrate image-derived depth estimates impedes broader application of this approach. One way to circumvent the need for field campaigns dedicated to calibration is to capitalize upon existing data. In this study, we introduce a framework for Bathymetric Mapping using Gage Records and Imag